Background information: Strengthening the competitiveness of domestic enterprises, particularly SMEs, is vital for developing countries to benefit fully from international trade and investment opportunities and to achieve the Millennium Development Goals. Export competitiveness is particularly important. This session will address policy measures that could assist developing countries in designing and implementing active policies for building export competitiveness, in particular how the regulatory framework can be strengthened, including by encouraging SMEs´ links to international supply chains, promoting backward and forward linkages of foreign affiliates and encouraging the developmental dimension of corporate responsibility.

Purpose: The purpose of this session is to highlight best policy examples of how to increase the export capacity of developing countries by enhancing the competitiveness of indigenous firms through linkages with high-quality, deeply rooted FDI and easier access to global and regional value chains of production.

Questions that will be addressed:
	What are the key (micro) determinants of export competitiveness?
	What are the main obstacles to the growth of the private sector in developing countries?
	What actions can governments undertake to help local economies to take advantage of FDI?
	How can the creation of sustainable TNC-SME linkages be promoted?
	Can TNCs contribute to develop the local productive capacity by upgrading SMEs?

Expected outcome: Towards this end the session will assist in formulating an approach on how to help developing countries to leverage investment, particularly FDI, to enhance export competitiveness of their firms, based on UNCTAD's blueprint on enterprise competitiveness policies and its compilation of best practices on business linkages.

Quick links: | Millennium Development Goals website |